One Lazy Afternoon
by Floopygirl
Summary: Sam and Jack are spending the afternoon at home. SJ established relationship, set in future. Fluff alert!


Spoilers: none

Season: Future

Pairings: S/J

Disclaimer: Not mine

A/N: I decided that I should see if I could write cute, sappy fic that wouldn't be so saccharine that people would hate it. The result? Well, it's sappy. (_leaves an ominous pause_) It could probably do with some more work, but I can't bear to read it again, so instead I'm throwing it here for everyone else.

Thanks to Drew for the fishing info – it really helped. And a huge thank-you to Jack for beta'ing this for me. I can't believe he's still answering my emails...

* * *

Jack took a gulp of beer as he watched her stare at the television, frown lines biting into the skin between her eyebrows. Over the years he'd seen his (former) second-in-command in many incarnations – gun-toting soldier, innovative astrophysicist, all-knowing all-fixing computer genius. More recently he'd been granted a second glimpse into her life as her... what? Her boyfriend, or her partner? Neither word seemed to fit – both were just giant clichés, and seemed so empty. Still, he was damned if the he was going to label himself as just her ex-CO.

Leaving that issue aside for now – he could deal with that panic next time he had to make introductions – he continued to analyse her essential Carterness, hoping for an insight into her current behaviour. Sure, she was sarcastic and cranky and, contrary to popular opinion, could be incredibly messy, seemingly oblivious to the existence of laundry hampers or dish washers. But occasionally, for the odd unguarded moment or so, he got to see her being incredibly... sweet. She'd kick his ass if she ever heard him say it – he glanced over at her, just to make sure that she couldn't read his mind – but that was the truth of it.

She laughed at his jokes, no matter how bad they were, until he'd consciously begun to make them worse and worse, just to see how far he could go before she'd stop laughing – and unfortunately for everyone else, he'd yet to reach that point. When they were together and he was drinking beer, she watched to see how much he had left in his bottle and would quietly fetch him a new one once he was down to his last few gulps. And during the night she clung to him in her sleep, even in the hottest weather, till he'd started turning up the air con before going to bed in anticipation of the extra body heat.

He felt as though every time they were together she allowed him to see more of her quirks and foibles. This time however he was at a loss – she was watching the Simpsons with total absorption, and he had no idea why.

She turned toward him as if she'd heard his thoughts – he swore she must have a Goa'uld telepathy-device stashed away somewhere, which she used solely to torment him. "You're going to cut yourself again if you don't watch what you're doing," she commented.

Oops. He looked down at the fishing reel he was trying to unwind. Evil, stubborn device sent to ruin his day. He took another mouthful of beer in protest.

Earlier on, everything had been wonderful. He'd been contentedly untangling the line from the reel, while a warm and sleepy Sam lay curled into his side. The line had formed such a rat's nest however that he'd given up on finishing the task by hand, and had instead resorted to using a knife to cut through the knots. Which was fine until a particularly vicious snarl had caused his arm to slip, his elbow to catch on her ribs and the knife to slice into one of his fingers. He would have been happy to class the cut as a tiny nick, nothing worth bothering about, but Sam had ordered him to go and clean it straight away, muttering under her breath something about careless men and painful bruises.

He'd come back to find her sitting on the other side of the couch, watching the Simpsons with all the concentration she normally reserved for a faulty naquadah reactor. He didn't get it. Was this some bizarre kind of carrot/stick combination designed to make him focus on what he was doing? Because it wasn't working. In fact, it was driving him nuts.

He stared over at her. "You know, it's meant to be entertainment." Her eyes flickered towards him, an eyebrow arched in silent question, before she returned her attention to the television set. "The Simpsons? You're not supposed to concentrate – it's supposed to be fun."

"I find concentrating fun," she replied, not looking towards him. He sighed inwardly: of course she did. That's why she still liked to spend so much of her downtime in her lab, despite all of his protests. It had been a major battle to get her to take the day off today, and now she was spending it ignoring him.

He tried again. "Sam, you know I don't have to finish unwinding this reel right now. I can do it some other time." He hoped she'd take the hint and scoot back over to him, but that would have been far too easy.

This time she actually looked away from the screen, leading him to feel as though he'd achieved some major victory. Except that she was still on the other side of the couch.

"Jack, I don't want to stop you from doing your stuff. I'm quite happy watching the Simpsons."

Her voice was entirely reasonable, but he still wasn't convinced. He grabbed the remote from her unresisting hand and turned the TV off.

"Hey!"

He ignored her cry of protest. "You're bored stiff, aren't you?"

"No." He stared at her. "No!" And kept waiting... "Okay, maybe a little."

A wave of guilt surged through him. It was her day off and he'd wanted her to have a good time – instead she was watching cartoons and going slowly nuts. "I'm really sorry."

She shook her head. "You don't have to be. You see, this is boring, but I'm not bored."

"Huh?"

He was totally lost. This was the problem with going out with someone so much smarter than him – half the time he could only understand every other sentence. Unfortunately, this was one of those other times when he couldn't even get that much.

She stared at him patiently. "Sure, I find the Simpsons boring, but you like watching them so I feel I should make an effort," she explained. "Despite that, I like being with you and I like watching you... do whatever you've been doing with that fishing reel, so I'm not bored."

Ah. That was totally... cute. There was no other way of saying it.

"I'm taking all the line off it." She stared at him blankly. "Off the reel? You have to do it once a year, because the longer the line stays on the reel, the more memory is built into it and the more brittle it becomes."

"Memory?"

"Memory is when the line molds itself to the reel – too much memory means the line forms a wavy pattern, not a straight line, when you cast it. Then the line's more likely to tangle when you reel it back in."

"Ah." She paused, apparently considering what he'd just said. He found himself holding his breath – maybe she'd been won over by his explanation and would come and sit back next to him.

"That's so much less boring now that I understand what's going on," she retorted.

"We could do something else entirely?" he suggested. "Something interesting that doesn't bore you either?"

He wanted to offer her a shoulder rub, a foot rub, anything to make her happier, but he suspected the closest he'd be getting to Carter-flesh right then would be a fist in the nose.

So her exasperated look didn't really come as a surprise, but then it turned into something else. Bashfulness?

"For the last eight years or so, you've always had to put up with everything I'm interested in." She stared down at her feet, which were poking out from under her. "I wanted to do something you like for a change."

Wow. His former second-in-command, aka 'gun-toting, sun-destroying badass at your service', really had a sentimental streak a mile long. Not only that, but she'd let him see it twice in as many minutes. She made him feel as gooey as the inside of a toasted marshmallow.

He thought that last bit over again and screwed up his face. Okay, maybe not, but he was still touched.

"Jack?" She was glaring at him now, and he realised that he'd been so busy contemplating his inner confectionary that he'd forgotten to reply. Oops.

How to respond? "It wasn't all your stuff." Oh, real articulate. He was so going to be sleeping on the couch tonight.

"It wasn't all my stuff?"

"Over the last eight years. Some of it was _our_ stuff." Like the shooting and the... shooting. Forget tonight, he'd be sleeping alone for a month. Where was his beer?

"What about all my doohickeys, and all my technobabble? You used to interrupt me a few words into _every_ explanation – I never got to finish so much as a single sentence!" He risked a glance at her, noticing her narrowed eyes. It was time for some serious groveling. He shifted towards her.

"First of all," he lifted a finger, "I loved your doohickeys. They were fantastic to play with." She leaned in to hit him on the arm, but he dodged the blow and caught her wrist in his. He didn't think she was too serious about hurting him – otherwise she wouldn't have missed – but there was no point in taking any chances. "Secondly, do you have any idea how hot you look when you're doing your best geek-impression?"

All her struggling ceased. That was one way to shut her up, he thought smugly, as he grabbed her other wrist – just in case.

"Hot?" she asked. He nodded. "Really?"

He nodded again. "Wow," she said.

He decided it was probably safe to let go of her arms, even if it meant letting the opportunity for an impromptu wrestling match slip by. She didn't even notice. "For all those years?"

Was it really so difficult for her to take in? "Yes! Every time you launched into an explanation of how one of your artifacts worked, or of how the planet was about to explode into a billion smithereens, I found you hot! I still do. Happy now?"

He saw her stare down at her feet again. Now what was she thinking?

She began speaking in a very small voice. "You know, your fishing reel explanation was kind of hot too."

Gah! He understood why she'd been so blown away by his words just a minute ago – while he knew (or at the very least hoped) that his feelings for her were mutual, he'd have never guessed that talking fishing would do it for her.

That was totally worth knowing.

He saw that a cheesy grin had crept over her face, matching his own. It looked like peace all round in the O'Neill household. Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

"So, can we watch the Simpsons again?"

She hesitated. "I could break your arm in three places, you know."

He nodded. "Yup." He knew she could, but also knew it was far more fun for her to threaten than to take action.

Most of the time.

She studied him for a bit longer. "Good." And then she abruptly morphed back into cuteness and he had warm, cuddly Carter leaning against him. "You can turn the TV back on."

He smiled as he put an arm around her, grabbing the remote with the other. Somehow, heaven knows how, he'd played this just right, and had ended up with Carter in his arms, _suggesting_ they watched his favourite TV show.

Now, if she'd only realise that his beer bottle was empty, life would be perfect. He considered mentioning it to her but abandoned that idea pretty quickly. He'd had far too good a day to end it with a trip to the infirmary.

It was still tempting though.


End file.
